The Morning After
by Austin Blake
Summary: Angel's thoughts after some major events....(think the summary sucks? Read and find out what I mean...)


DISCLAIMER: I do not own any of the following characters...just using them for my own personal enjoyment. (Dance, puppets, dance!)  
  
DEDICATION: Molly and all her friends, plus all those who let out the cry, "Buffy and Angel FOREVER!!!!" Let me hear you! P.S., Buffy-Spike shippers, I have one thing to say: "Booooooooooooooo!!!"  
  
FEEDBACK: I am the feedback man-whore of the universe! (I charge $10, but I'm willing to negociate.)  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
THE MORNING AFTER  
  
Angel laid in Buffy's bed, enjoying his much-needed rest after last night's escapades, slowly replaying all the events in his mind. He and Buffy embracing, rocking back and forth as their bodies became one in a tender union of souls, lather, rinse, repeat until exhaustion. During his silent reverie, he was jolted to consciousness by a loud crash coming from downstairs. He sat up, his coal-black locks unkempt from a rough night. As his now-human eyes focused with the morning sunlight, the dark orbs went wide, seeing a small wisps of smoke floating past him.  
  
He stood, placing on a pair of black jogging pants on his naked body before making his way down the staircase. What he saw next was the most terrifying sight he had ever seen in his many years of maiming and brutal torture.  
  
Buffy was holding a frying pan.  
  
"Put. The spatula. Down." Angel said, approaching Buffy cautiously as if she were a venomous snake. She stared at him, her deep hazel eyes showing a hint of confusion. He slowly removed the cooking utensils from her grasp, lying them down on the flour-laden counter. He turned to her as if about to scold a child.  
  
"I become human for one day," he said, "and you try to kill me?"  
  
"I put the fire out," Buffy said, suddenly turning and batting at a few flaring embers with a blackened dish towel, "well, almost. I was just making breakfast for you."  
  
"That's what I meant."  
  
Buffy smiled, hitting him playfully on the shoulder. "Think you can do better?"  
  
"Buffy, no offense, but Drusilla could do better using only Miss Edith as a guide. I mean, your culinary skills do leave something to be desired."  
  
She pouted, but the pout became a sly smirk as she leaned against him, nipping at his bottom lip with the tip of her tongue. "But they're the only ones, right? That...leave something to be desired..."  
  
"But of course. Not even sunshine can make me scream like that. Although, the sight of you cooking, or failure thereof, came pretty close."  
  
Buffy pushed him to the floor roughly, pouncing on his body lightly as she attempted to straddle him. He rolled over on top of her, a slight smile confidently showing that he had the upper hand. She rolled back on top of him, pinning his shoulders down. He rolled hard, and across the floor they went, a tangle of arms, legs, and giggles.  
  
That's when Angel woke up in a cold sweat.  
  
Dead. Buffy was dead. He sat up with a start, his deep brown eyes searching the empty darkness of his room for answers. It had all been a dream. He closed his eyes and silently prayed that ALL of it had been a dream, just a cruel but easily gotten over nightmare. But as his eyes slowly reopened, he remembered. Willow. She had come, given the news, watched him go completely numb, just standing there in the lobby for hours, oblivious to all those around him. After getting over the original shock of the news, he had gone upstairs to his room, failing to speak a word or show the slightest emotion. He laid in his bed, tossing and turning until he finally broke down with exhaustion. Willow had gone home - back to Sunnydale - without him. This, this wasn't grieving.  
  
This was brooding, and he cursed himself for it, slowly rising out of bed. He placed his black jogging pants on, his angelic features suddenly taxed as if his many years had caught up with him. They looked worn - downright haggard, although he'd never know it unless he was told - in his remembrance of his recent dream. No, it too had been a nightmare. The one thing he truly desired, now gone, out of his grasp forever. He somehow couldn't comprehend the fact that she was really gone. He appeared exactly how he felt: tired, old, and not wanting to live anymore.  
  
God, it hurt. Hurt to move. Hurt to see. Hurt to think. Hurt to just exist. He didn't know what he had become. All he knew was that he didn't want to 'be' at all. He could just hurl his curtains open and bathe in the ever-reliant sunshine, and it would all be over. The pain. The suffering. The killing. Loved ones around him seemed to be dropping like flies. But never, even in his wildest dreams, would he thought of Buffy as being the next to go.  
  
Someday. It was always someday. Someday, they'd be together again. Someday, he'd come back to her. Someday, she was destined to die. Little did he know, one of those 'somedays' had been yesterday. No one even called him for the funeral...the world was coming to an end and poor Angel didn't deserve to know? It seemed that the only time people wanted him around was when someone had passed. First Joyce, now her daughter following suit? Can't anybody ever give him a call that doesn't involve death or an Apocalypse or saving lost souls? Whatever happened to "I just called to say I love you"?  
  
He closed his eyes again, his moves in automatic. He hadn't realized he had dressed himself and was heading downstairs. He just wasn't there. His heart, his very soul, was gone. Ripped out. They had died with Buffy. She was his one Reason for continuing on...so he could atone...become human...give her everything he thought he couldn't. Selfish thoughts, he knew, but they were true. He'd never atone if he thought that way, but never would try to redeem himself if he didn't. Ain't unlife a bitch?  
  
No. The real bitch is, she deserved so much more than this. She deserved a boyfriend with a pulse, someone with warmth in their cuddle, someone with whom she could have children and lead a relatively normal life for once. But no. God forbid, she should be granted a little happiness in her life. A reward for all her selfless actions.  
  
The Powers That Be hadn't just taken someone from him that he held dear. They had taken quite possibly their greatest warrior and in the process condemned the world to suffer endlessly at the hands of the NEXT Apocalypse. The entire universe was going to fall apart.  
  
And, truth be told, Angel didn't care.  
  
His life, his world, his universe had fallen apart when Buffy took that great leap of faith...and gotten the Almighty's shaft in the end. There was only one thing he wanted: for it to be over. Either the suffering would end, or his unlife would. If what they did actually mattered, then the Powers wouldn't have just taken Buffy like that and risk all of existance being annihilated. So, if nothing they did mattered, maybe he should just let Angelus out again. That'd get their attention. It would damn sure show them a thing or two about who really deserved to die a painful heartwrenching death.  
  
Before he had known it, he had slammed his fist into the wall, shattering it like glass, his bleeding fist buried in a small cement crater as Cordelia, Wesley, and Gunn looked on in awe. But his dark eyes were empty, devoid of all emotion or feeling whatsoever.  
  
"Y-You alright...?"  
  
Cordelia. Ever the Observant One.  
  
"What time is sundown?"  
  
"In about 3 hours. You slept most of the day," Wesley said. "Why?"  
  
"We're going to Sunnydale. I have to-...I have to see it..."  
  
"See what?" Gunn asked.  
  
Angel could hear Wesley whispering an explanation behind his back, but it was tuned out. All there was in him was rage, guilt, fear, depression, anxiety - a world of emotions, kept hidden from the world by his human guise.  
  
"See the grave. He has to mourn, Gunn."  
  
"Oh," Cordelia said, "That would explain the Super Smash Brother attitude."  
  
Angel remembered days like these - back in Ireland. As a human. The man formerly known as Liam Kells. In the late night hours, in the scummiest of bars, he could be found fondling women as he devoured the greasiest food yet the finest of drink. He always hated the morning after, though. Damn hangovers - but it never taught him a lesson.  
  
They were trying to test him. Had to be. Every God-damned thing that happened to him was a test. But this, this was just brutal torture - the most agonizing torment that had ever been inflicted on him. What, they expected him to break? To crumble? To slump to the floor and bawl like a child? Perhaps he would. But not today. He wouldn't disgrace Buffy's memory like that. She was strong in the face of avid danger, confronting the very blackest of evils on an everyday basis.  
  
The Powers could send everything they had at him today.  
  
Buffy would NOT let him fall to the likes of them.  
  
Not today.  
  
  
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Life it seems, will fade away  
Drifting further everyday  
Getting lost within myself  
Nothing matters, no one else  
I have lost the will to live  
Simply nothing more to give  
There is nothing more for me  
Need the end to set me free  
  
Things not what they used to be  
Missing one inside of me  
Deathly lost, this can't be real  
Cannot stand this hell I feel  
Emptiness is filling me  
To the point of agony  
Growing darkness taking dawn  
I was me, but now he's gone  
  
No one but me can save myself, but it's too late  
Now I think, think why should I even try?  
  
Yesterday seems as though it never existed  
Death greets me warm, now I will just say goodbye  
  
- "Fade To Black" by Metallica  
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End file.
